Habit: Perennial herb with caudex (annual or biennial); hairs stellate, +- sessile.
Stem: erect to decumbent or prostrate, simple or branched distally.
Leaf: basal generally rosetted, simple, entire to wavy or dentate (pinnately lobed); cauline petioled or sessile, entire to wavy or dentate, base not lobed.
Flower: sepals oblong to ovate, erect or spreading, sac-like at base; petals yellow (white or +- purple), widely ovate to spoon-shaped, clawed or not.
Fruit: silicle, dehiscent, spheric to ovoid, ellipsoid, oblong, or spectacle-shaped, inflated and bladdery or not, unsegmented, generally not flattened (flattened); stigma entire.
Seed: 4--28(40), in 2 rows, wingless (narrowly winged).
Species In Genus: 105 species: western North America, South America.
Etymology: (Greek: bladder, from inflated fruit)
Jepson eFlora Author: Ihsan A. Al-Shehbaz
Reference: Al-Shehbaz & O'Kane 2002 Novon 12:319--329
Unabridged Reference: Rollins & Shaw 1973 Harvard Univ Press:1--228Index of California Plant Names (ICPN; linked via the Jepson Online Interchange)Key to Physaria
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